“Emmy Jane, wake up.”
Trying to rub the sleep from my eyes, I propped myself up on wobbly elbows. An old couple hovered above me with determined expressions.
Determined to drive me crazy! “What are you doing in my room?”
The old woman turned a frown. “We need your help.”
She could have been anyone’s grandma. She could have been my grandma. But I didn’t care anymore. I was tired of these intrusions into my sanity.
“Don’t you realize I have school tomorrow?” God, why couldn’t I have been a normal girl?
The old man shifted in front of the woman. The outline of a long, scraggly beard was still visible despite his translucent form. “It’s me, your grandpa, Emmy Jane.”
Annoyed, I rolled my eyes. “I don’t have a grandpa.”
The old woman attempted to nudge him, but her elbow just slipped in his body, like running a knife through Jell-O. “This ain’t Emmy Jane, Ed.”
Scowling, he shook his head. “Of course she is, Grandma.”
“Look, aren’t you people supposed to be sleeping…like all the time?” Why did they wake me up just to argue? I was tired and getting more annoyed by the second.
Ignoring me, Grandma proceeded to prove Grandpa wrong. “Emmy Jane was a good head taller.”
Great, now even the dead were poking fun of my height. What would they criticize next? My dull brown eyes or my hair which looked more like an electrified mop on my head?
“Hello, dead people, please leave.” Waving my arms at them, I tried to get their attention. “I can’t go to school with circles under my eyes.”
Grandpa threw up his hands. “Well then, who is she?”
Holy crap! Did people lose their hearing when they died? They were treating me as if I was dead.
“I don’t know.” Grandma shrugged. “But she sees us and that’s all that matters.”
The spirits turned toward me.
I instinctively rubbed my arms. I didn’t know why dead people always gave me the chills, but they did. Still, I was relieved to finally get their attention, yet weirded out, too. I mean, yeah, I was used to dead people waking me up at night. But I couldn’t say I liked it.
I realized by their clothes that they must have lived in the last century. Grandpa’s long beard was kind of goofy, but the way his eyes fixed on me creeped me out. Make that one eye. The other eye kept rolling to the back of his head. Although Grandma had a sweet kind of smile, she looked a little too cliché with her knit shawl and hair pinned back in some out-of-style bun.
I hoped I wasn’t going to be that uncool when I died. I mean, I knew I couldn’t take my cosmetics with me, but I would still insist on a decent hairstyle for my burial. Hopefully, by the time I died, longer lasting anti-frizz products would be on the market.
I sighed, realizing that getting rid of these pests wouldn’t be easy. “Do you mind telling me what you’re doing in my room?”
“I’m Gertrude.” She pulled tightly on her shawl before nodding toward Grandpa. “This here’s Ed. We’d be much obliged for a moment of your time.”
Feeling my teeth grind together, I had to remind myself to unlock my jaw before I rubbed off all my enamel. “Do I have a choice?”
“No.” Ed shook his head. “She’s much too sassy to be Emmy Jane.”
What nerve! As if he had any right to come into my room without asking, waking me up on a school night. I clenched my fists into balls, only releasing my fingers after realizing my nails were breaking skin. “Excuse me, but I was sleeping.”
“So was I.” Punching his fist in the air, Ed started yelling. “But them people started poking around my restin’ place. They tore down that old oak tree. That tree been there before I was buried.”
An involuntary chill raced up my spine as the air around me grew colder.
“Don’t mind him.” Gertrude rolled her eyes, making another futile poke in his ribcage. “He’s been a grumpy old goat for over a hundred years.”
Ed wagged his finger at me. “You’d be hotter than a poker stick if they turned your tombstone to rubble.”
“Shush now, Ed.” Gertrude swatted him, only to have her hand swoosh through his chest. “You’re scarin’ the girl.”
“I’m not scared. I’ve seen plenty of dead people.” I sat up, pulling the threadbare comforter over my midsection and hugging my knees for warmth. I kept my gaze fixed on the unwelcome guests. “Now what do you want?”
Ed’s shoulders fell, the bottom portion of his face turning down. “We want our graveyard back.”
Unbelievable! What did they expect from me? Go to a graveyard in the middle of the night and fix their tombstones? “What am I supposed to do about it?”
Clasping both hands together, Gertrude’s eyes twinkled with an unnatural glow. “We thought you’d never ask.”
****
Closed Facebook Group/Some ungodly hour of the morning
Just call me your average, everyday fashion goddess who knows how to accessorize any outfit or summon a poltergeist.
You heard me correctly.
I don’t know why dead people want to talk to me, but they do. It’s not like I can help them. Dead people don’t know a thing about fashion and they’re really not interested in the latest trends. Too bad. That would make my life so much easier.
Why, you ask?
Because a couple of ancients visited my bedroom last night and asked me to do the unthinkable! I mean, they’re already dead, so why do they have to ruin my life, too? It’s bad enough they’re always spooking me when I’m trying to sleep, but now they want me to stop the new mall project and save their sacred burial site. Come on! I’m just fourteen. Why don’t they go bother the mayor or something?
I don’t have time to fix the lives of the deceased. I’ve got a lot going on right now. Bryon Thomas, my new lab partner in science, is a total hottie. He’s coming over tomorrow night so we can work on a project. What if they show up? He’ll freak. And worse, he could tell the whole school. My social life would be, excuse the pun, dead.
Besides, they really don’t understand how badly I want that mall. Only five minutes from my apartment. How cool is that?
No, I can’t do it. I won’t.
The mall is expected to open when I turn sixteen, just when I’m old enough to get a real job. I heard employees get a thirty percent discount at most of the stores. No more traveling to the outlet mall forty-five miles out of town. Besides, don’t they realize what stopping this mall would do to my reputation? I mean, I know I’m barely five-feet-two, but I still have time to grow. One day, I’m going to be on the cover of Cosmo. But if these ghosts keep driving me crazy, I’ll be the poster child for Weirdo.